Letters to the editor - May 14, 2013

Monday

May 13, 2013 at 9:31 PM

Sales taxes are the most regressive taxes of all, and Sen. Phil Berger has hatched a scheme to levy a cruelly brutal burden on the poorest of North Carolina tax payers.Early in the new legislative session there was a hint of this, but most of us believed the thing would never be seriously considered, but we were wrong. The Star News laid it all out in an editorial on May 12 … Need heart medicine? Pay sales tax. Family groceries tax triples to 6.5 percent. Your car needs service? Add the tax on top. This is just a partial list …The poorest of our citizens are, once again, targeted for the squeeze while the wealthiest – again – are relatively untouched. And corporations will see a reduction of income tax as this legislature slashes and blunders along in its war against what’s left of the middle class.We are not helpless. Write to representatives, call them, pester them, demand sanity in Raleigh and remind the Honorables that the people hold the final power.This issue is but one egg in a nest of mischief being hatched for us in Raleigh. Watch closely and demand better than we’ve seen so far. Art Darwin, Wilmington

The Marine Corps relieved from command three officers responsible for supervision of the unit involved in a training accident that resulted in the death of several service members. While the officers affected were not directly responsible for the accident, they were held accountable for the command environment that may have contributed to the event. That absolute accountability is called leadership.Another tragedy occurred at the diplomatic facility in Benghazi, Libya. In this case, accountability was clouded by misleading statements, deflections and a fervent hope that the issue would simply go away. No one directly responsible for the operation in Libya has been held accountable for the failures that led to the death of these Americans. This failure to assign accountability and obfuscate reality is called politics.Therefore, when you vote for a politician don’t believe you are necessarily getting leadership. The two terms may well be mutually exclusive. Set your expectations accordingly. Gary Purdum, Wilmington

If the assault weapons ban had been renewed, Adam Lanza would not have had the rifle or 30-round magazine. (According to a recent study), states with the most restrictive gun laws generally have lower rates of gun violence than states with more permissive laws.If the 30,000 people who die from guns died from disease we’d call it an epidemic. Guns kill twice as many kids as cancer, five times as many as heart disease and 15 times more than infection. The Tucson shooter and the Thurston High School shooter were tackled when they went to reload. As many as 11 Newtown children escaped when Lanza went to reload. Now, maybe to some those 11 children’s lives are not as important as the extra 20 bullets in an extended magazine, but I’m not one of them. Robert Ernst, Wilmington